Blue Jays aim to unleash potent offence in Game 3

Blue Jays players are saying all the right things ahead of their biggest game of the season.

"We have to be patient, focus better." "We have to keep playing." "We haven't played our best." "We've just got to win the next one."

And … "I'm not ready to go home, yet."

Toronto will try to avoid elimination and a three-game sweep in its best-of-five American League Division Series when it visits the Texas Rangers on Sunday (8:10 p.m. ET).

Forty-seven times teams have fallen behind 2-0 in the best-of-five division series, with only five having fought back to advance in the baseball post-season. 

The key for the AL East champion Blue Jays, besides having big hitters Josh Donaldson, Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion and Troy Tulowitzki get out of their combined 5-for-35 funk, is to get the leadoff hitter on base in the early innings and across the plate in hopes of taking the all-important early lead.

It was the Rangers who jumped on Toronto's top starters, David Price and Marcus Stroman, early in Games 1 and 2, scoring twice in the first inning in Thursday's series opener and twice in the third for a 2-0 advantage on Friday.

"I think we need a big outburst with the bats, score a lot of runs, really," Blue Jays manager John Gibbons told reporters during Saturday's off-day in Arlington, Tex., where his team won two of three late in August but was 40-41 on the road in the regular season.

"If you look at our season anyway, you know, we score — we score and win, we score in bunches. That's kind of our trademark."

Top offence

Toronto owned the best offence in baseball during the regular season and boasted a starting staff with three of the four best earned-run averages in the AL following the all-star break, but none of that is helping much so far in this series.

Texas has put itself in position to advance to the AL Championship Series one season after going 67-95.

Marco Estrada, who owned the second-best ERA in the AL after the all-star break behind Price at 2.78, will take the mound on Sunday against left-hander Martin Perez.

I'm going to give it my all no matter what.- Marco Estrada, Blue Jays' Game 3 starter

The 32-year-old Estrada, who was 13-8 with a 3.13 ERA overall this season, gets in trouble occasionally by giving up home runs – 13 in his final 10 starts – which isn't what Toronto fans want to hear about with Sunday's game being contested at the hitter-friendly Globe Life Park.

However, Estrada is confident he can continue a stretch that saw him allow three earned runs or fewer in 12 of his final 13 outings.

"I'm going to give it my all no matter what," Estrada told reporters. "Like I said, if we were up 2-0 or down 0-2, like we are, it's the same mentality for me."

Perez (3-6, 4.46) gets the nod over veterans Colby Lewis and Derek Holland due to his consistency down the stretch and a final two starts in which he allowed one earned run in 13 innings.

The 24-year-old Venezuelan posted a 3.38 ERA over his final 11 starts and surrendered three or fewer earned runs in 11 of his 14 starts in 2015.

Perez is facing the Blue Jays for the first time in his career while making his first career post-season appearance.

NOTES:

• Blue Jays' left-handed reliever Brett Cecil suffered a torn left calf on Friday and will miss the remainder of the post-season.
• Rangers 3B Adrian Beltre (back) sat out Game 2 and remains day to day.
• Texas CF Delino DeShields is 5-for-11 with three runs scored and a pair of RBIs in the series.